Pietro Cavallini (1259 – c. 1330) was an Italian painter and mosaic designer working during the late Middle Ages.
YouTube Encyclopedic
-
1/3Views:22 9255 668817
-
Pietro Cavallini, The Last Judgment
-
Pietro Cavallini a Santa Cecilia
-
Pietro Cavallini
Transcription
(piano music) Man: We're in Santa Cecilia in Rome looking at the ruins of an extraordinary fresco by Cavallini from the late thirteenth century. Woman: We're above the entrance to the church and we're looking directly at a fresco that in the late thirteenth century people would have looked up at and it's a scene of the last judgment. Man: Right so this would have been on the wall opposite the altar and this would have been the last thing you saw as you were leaving the church. It's a monumental fresco. You see Christ in the center in a mandorla, that is a kind of divine emanation or halo that surrounds his entire body. He sits here as judge over the souls that have lived. Woman: And he exhibits for us very clearly the wounds of the crucifixion. We can see holes from the nails in his feet and his hands, and the wound in his side that is bleeding. A reminder of Christ's suffering. His return now is judge of mankind. Man: He is framed by angels on either side and beyond that we can see the apostles, six on each side. Between the apostles and Christ there were two other figures. You have Mary on Christ's right and you have John the Baptist on Christ's left. Woman: And we're so clearly at just before the time of Jato in the way these prefigure what Jato will do in the very early years of the fourteenth century. Man: Right. This is known as Roman realism. He's clearly borrowing from the Byzantine but there is a kind of unprecedented interest in creating a sense of naturalism as figures of our world. Woman: That can be seen in how heavily the figures are all modeled. There is not thin elongated forms created by line, but really monumental forms created by the use of light and dark. Man: You can see that use of light and dark very consistently in the furniture as well, and the light makes it very believable. The line is drawn so that there is a precocious attempt at a kind of perspective. Not true linear perspective of course, but something that is very much trying to explain how these angles function in space as one looks up from below. Woman: That's right, especially evident in the seats that the apostles sit in. They angle inward toward the center. So it's as though they really are thinking about us as the viewer in the center looking up at Christ. Man: There is a kind of sensitivity in terms of rhythm and especially color in this painting that is so beautiful. Look at the apostles. You have alternations of violet blues, red blues, grey blues, green against a warmer kind of grey moving across so that there is never a repeat of the color, just beautiful. Woman: And we get a sense of a three-dimensional body underneath that drapery. If you look at the apostles, we can see the drapery pulling around their bellies, around their shoulders, in the folds around their arms. Giving us a sense of monumental figures that really haven't been seen since ancient Rome. Man: It's interesting to think about this move from the spiritual rendering that is a kind of symbolized body to one that is dimensional, one that takes up space, and this idea that there is a proximity between the way in which these figures are rendered and the bodies that we inhabit. Woman: And the kind of human emotions that we feel. If you look at the figure of Saint John the Baptist with his hands clasped in prayer, the way that he moves his eyebrows together and there are wrinkles in his forehead and he looks toward Christ. There is a real sense of individuality to these figures and a sense of human emotion as they look toward Christ. Man: But these are still clearly coming out of the Byzantine tradition. If you look at the face of Christ we might be looking at a mosaic from Ravenna from Constantinople. Woman: That's right. This moment at the end of the 1200s, the beginnings of the 1300s when we have this imminent naturalism. Man: Of course Catallini does not know that is coming. That's our hindsight. Nevertheless, we can see this kind of painting along with the sculptures of Pisano or perhaps the work of Cimabue as we're beginning to move into what will eventually become the Renaissance. (piano music)
Biography
Little is known about his biography, though it is known he was from Rome, since he signed pictor romanus.
His first notable works were the fresco cycles for the Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura, with stories from the New and Old Testament (1277–1285). They were destroyed by the fire of 1823.
His Last Judgment in the Church of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere in Rome, painted c. 1293 and considered Cavallini's masterwork, demonstrates an artistic style known as Roman naturalism. This naturalism influenced the work of artists working in other Italian cities such as Florence and Siena.
In the Sienese school, the influence of classical Roman forms combined with the Byzantine artistic heritage of the region and with northern Gothic influences to form a naturalized painting style that was one of the origins of International Gothic.
In Florence, the influence of classical Roman forms combined with the Byzantine artistic heritage of the region to spark an interest in volumetric, naturalistic paintings and statuary. This work is in stark contrast to the comparatively flat and ornamented Gothic, International Gothic, and Byzantine styles.
This naturalism is also evident in the Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi in Assisi, built in the early years of the 13th century in honour of the newly canonized St. Francis. As the shrine was commissioned by the Roman church, its interior is painted in the Roman tradition. The identities of the artists at work in this church are for the most part not known but at least one team of artists came from Rome. Owing to the similarity of the work in San Francesco to that of Florentine artist Giotto, he was traditionally credited with some of the frescoes, although most scholars no longer believe he was involved.
Giotto's work in the Arena Chapel (also known as the Scrovegni Chapel) at Padua strongly shows the influence of stylized Roman naturalism in a newly individualized style which would come to characterize the work of Florentine Renaissance artists.
From 1308 Cavallini worked in Naples at the court of King Charles II of Anjou, notably in the churches of San Domenico Maggiore (1308) and Santa Maria Donnaregina (1317), together with his fellow Roman Filippo Rusuti. He returned to Rome before 1325, beginning the external decoration of the Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura in 1321, with a series of Byzantine-style mosaics.
Cavallini's pupils included Giovanni di Bartolommeo.
Works
His works include:
- Jael and Tisseran (date unknown), watercolour
- Scenes from the life of Mary (c. 1298), mosaics at the apse of Basilica di Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome.[1] The six scenes were made by the order of Bertoldo Stefaneschi, brother of Cardinal Giacomo Gaetani Stefaneschi, and include a donor portrait of him. These mosaics are praised for their realistic portrayal and attempts at perspective:
- Nativity of the Virgin
- Annunciation
- The Birth of Jesus
- Adoration of the Magi
- Presentation in the Temple
- Dormition
- The Last Judgment (1295–1298), part of fresco cycle at Santa Cecilia in Trastevere in Rome.
The apse paintings at San Giorgio al Velabro, Rome, have been attributed to him on the basis of stylistic similarity to the Trastevere paintings.
The apse mosaic of the San Crisogono church in the Trastevere district, depicting the Mary with Sts. Sebastian and Chrysogonos, is also attributed to Cavallini.
The illustrated Clement Bible has been attributed to Cavallini or his workshop.
References
Sources
- Enio Sindona, Pietro Cavallini, editorial Italian Institute, Milan 1958.
- Guglielmo Matthiae, Pietro Cavallini, De Luca, Rome 1972.
- Paul Hetherington, Pietro Cavallini: a study in the art of Late Medieval Rome, The Sagittarius Press, London 1979. ISBN 978-0-9503163-3-8
- Angiola Maria Romanini, The Eyes of Isaac. Classicism and scientific curiosity between Giotto and Arnolfo di Cambio, in "Medieval art", ns, I (1987).
- Emma Simi Varanelli, From Isaac Master in Giotto. Contribution to the history of medieval perspectiva communis, in "Medieval Art", ns III (1989), p. 115-143.
- Serena Romano, Eclipse in Rome: mural painting in Rome and Lazio by Boniface VIII to Martin V (1295-1431), Argos, Rome 1992. ISBN 8885897142
- Alessandro Parronchi, Cavallini disciple of Giotto, Florence 1994. ISBN 8885977154
- Pierluigi De Vecchi and Elda Cerchiari, The Times of art, Volume 1 Simon and Schuster, Milano 1999
- Alessandro Tomei, Pietro Cavallini, Silvana, Cinisello Balsamo 2000. ISBN 8882151654
- Bruno Zanardi, Giotto and Pietro Cavallini: the question of Assisi and the medieval construction of fresco painting, Skira, Milan 2002. ISBN 8884910560
- Roman paintings of Giotto and Cavallini, catalogue of the exhibition held in Rome in 2004 by Thomas Angelo and Strinati Tartuferi, Electa, Milano 2004. ISBN 8837030622
External links
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
| People | |
| Other | |
This page was last edited on 18 January 2024, at 05:13